Bone Marrow Transplantation for Acute Leukemia

To the Editor.—  In a letter to The Journal (241:1686, 1979), Blume and Beutler reported impressive survival data following bone marrow transplants performed between 1976 and 1978 in 11 patients with acute leukemia in remission. They expressed concern that an article from the International Bone Marrow Transplant Registry¹ "may create an unjustified negative attitude toward bone marrow transplantation in the treatment of acute leukemia." It is apparent that Blume and Beutler missed the point of the Registry article.The report from the Registry comprised 57 patients who were treated with bone marrow transplantation for end-stage acute myeloblastic leukemia (AML). The patients were treated between 1968 and 1976, when marrow transplantation was considered to be highly experimental and was attempted only after repeated failures with more conventional forms of therapy. Despite the fact that all of the patients in the Registry report were in relapse at the time of transplantation, analysis